


Inked

by alecmagnuslwb



Category: DCU (Comics)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Fluff, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-01
Updated: 2020-08-01
Packaged: 2021-03-06 07:54:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,945
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25649878
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alecmagnuslwb/pseuds/alecmagnuslwb
Summary: Former sidekicks turned civilians Roy Harper and Jason Todd get to know each other one tattoo session at a time.
Relationships: Roy Harper/Jason Todd
Comments: 2
Kudos: 94





	Inked

**Author's Note:**

> For day one of Writer’s Month, the prompt: Tattoo Artist/Flower Shop AU

The door swings open right on cue just like it has at three o’clock on the second Tuesday of every month this year.

Jason looks up from where he’d been sketching at the front desk when the little bell above the door chimes and he hates to admit he freezes for a moment. Roy Harper looks good, really good. He’s cut his hair since the last time he saw him for his monthly tattoo in July and it gives Jason a whole new view to admire.

The shoulder length red tresses are gone his hair now shaved down on the sides and a little longer at the top. Jason likes it, it gives him a view of Roy’s strong neck that had previously been covered. Roy lifts an arm running his hand through the top of his hair as he gives Jason one of those big beaming smiles he always seems to sport. The movement highlights his biceps which are blissfully exposed due to the oppressive August heat of the city.

He slips the beat-up grey trucker hat in his hand on his head backwards once he reaches the desk leaning on it with his strong exposed forearms.

“Hey, ya Jaybird. Ready for me?” he asks that grin still on his lips.

“Always,” Jason says closing up his sketchbook.

Jason moves back a bit so that he and Roy aren’t practically nose to nose. Not that he doesn’t want them to be nose to nose it’s just that they aren’t there yet. They might never be, he’s not really sure what’s going on between them if he’s being honest.

Jason and Roy have technically known each other since they were teens, back when they were Robin and Speedy the children of two of the most known superheroes in the world, but Jason made a choice to hang up the pixie boots before he graduated high school for his own mental and physical health and Roy chose the same after his first round in rehab had nearly killed him.

After that their paths had diverted. Jason had gone to art school and promptly dropped out a year later to pursue art on his own terms. Roy had attempted an engineering degree, but his mind was lightyears ahead of anything any college could teach so he’d flunked out for never doing his assignments properly.

Then came a dark year for both of them, a year that no amount of therapy will ever completely wash away. Jason had hit rock bottom with is career and his estrangement from Bruce for choosing a world outside of vigilantism came to a violent head while Roy hit his own rock bottom at the end of a needle.

It took years of failed relationships, bad decisions and hard work for them both to pull themselves back up out of it all, only ever really hearing about each other’s struggles through the gossip grapevine that is Dick Grayson.

Eventually Roy made his way back to Star City. Upon finding out he had a daughter he had gotten truly sober and stable for the first time in his life with the support of his dysfunctional super family. He made amends with Oliver, primarily through Dinah’s stubborn insistence they work it out, took to single fatherhood in a way he’d never taken to anything so quickly and got a job at a florist’s shop giving himself a peaceful place to spends his days that also allows him to tinker with every new invention he can in his spare time without the stress of making exploding arrows to fight crime at night.

Jason had had a similar path. He and Bruce still rest on shaky ground and he’s fairly certain they always will, but he’s good with his brood of siblings again and putting his art expression into something as permanent as tattoos has been therapeutic.

Moving to Star City for Jason had been a whim. He needed out of Gotham, he’d saved up enough to start his own shop to truly make a name for himself, but he couldn’t do it in a city that was swimming in Bats. Dick had been the one to suggest Star, at the time Jason hadn’t thought anything of it. Had just assumed he was sending him to a town that still had the comfort of rampant vigilantism, but with the advantage of being on the other side of the country from anything with the name Wayne slapped on it.

Ever since Roy came walking into his shop, Bat Tats a name he 100% chose to piss of his adoptive father, eight months ago on Dick’s suggestion Jason thinks maybe his overbearing brother had ulterior motives. That maybe there’s a reason Dick is one of the few people who understands why Jason and Roy have become so close.

So here they are now two former sidekicks with their fair share of daddy issues and trauma doing a little bit better in every aspect of their lives every day and finding a friendship in one another Jason’s come to treasure.

“No Lian today?” Jason asks as Roy moves on autopilot to his usual station to take a seat.

Roy shakes his head taking off his hat and throwing it on the wall ledge behind him.

“I love that little girl more than anything, but keeping her sitting still and entertained for an extended period of time can be a struggle, especially when she knows she could be playing outside,” he says chuckling. Jason smiles remembering some of the previous months when she had tagged along and the way Lian had twirled around on a swivel chair asking Jason a million questions and briefly running into one of the brick walls when she spun a little too hard bouncing back immediately not a single tear shed. “Don’t need her distracting you so much you end up accidentally inking me with something that looks like a dick.”

“Lian is no distraction, trust me, she’s a delight,” Jason responds with a smile as he sets up his station. He means it, Lian is a ball of energy with a smile like her father and wit far greater than most adults Jason has met. Roy is far more of a distraction, his tattoo in April which had been on his bare chest had nearly killed Jason. “And if I was going to tattoo a dick on you there would be nothing accidental about it.”

Roy full out belly laughs and Jason loves the sound.

“Speaking of dick’s,” he says as he rolls up his chair to Roy’s side snapping on his gloves. “You sure you don’t want that Nightwing tattoo? It’s a best seller.”

Jason tilts his head up to the wall where proudly, because Dick framed it the ass that he is, is the Nightwing symbol with a gold plate below it reading #1 bestseller. If Jason didn’t like paying his bills he’d probably stop offering it, but the last three months has seen a surge in his popularity since he and Babs essentially stopped an apocalypse on their own and Jason has found himself with at least a dozen requests for the symbol every week.

“Not a chance, I will not take part in fluffing Grayson’s ego, I refuse,” Roy says before gesturing down at his body. “This body is temple now.”

 _Damn right it is_ , Jason thinks eyes lingering a little too long at the body in question. Long enough that he’s pretty sure he’s been caught so he clears his throat not meeting Roy’s eye as he loads up the tattoo gun.

He doesn’t see Roy smirk as he stretches out his arm for Jason and he definitely doesn’t notice how Roy watches the white streaks at the front of his hair fall over his eyes intently as he bends his head to get to work.

Today’s tattoo is a simple one. A small date that’s just a few days away to be added onto his ‘Lian forearm’ as they call it, alongside her name, the word for daughter in Navajo and a handful of little drawings Lian herself has proudly designed. The date marks his fifth year of sobriety, the day he decided to be there for his little girl for the rest of his days.

They chat while Jason works, Jason trying to ignore the way Roy’s scars feel warm under his fingers at every pass. Roy gives an update on Lian as back to school nears and Jason updates him on the weirdest tattoo requests he’s had the past few weeks. His personal favorite being the 82-year-old grandma who’d come in requesting a tattoo of a lion’s head that her grandson designed.

Roy chuckles as Jason finishes up getting the materials to wrap up the new ink.

“Well she sounds cool as hell, any chance she’s willing to take on new grandchildren?” he asks.

“I asked, she said she could direct me to some equally as cool friends since she’s already got 13 of her own,” Jason chuckles as he finishes wrapping up Roy's arm. “All done.”

He pulls away with a smile snapping the gloves off and throwing them in a nearby trash can. They walk back up to the front together, Roy paying and tipping him way too much like he always does.

“You’re absolutely worth it,” Roy says when Jason tries to wave off the excessive tip. Jason’s breath catches, the context isn’t remotely what Jason’s dumb gay brain is thinking, but it feels loaded anyways.

Jason brushes it off best he can. “If you say so,” he shrugs. 

“I do,” Roy says back instantly not missing a beat. Jason’s about to ask him if his tattoo streak is going to continue next month, but Roy beats him to it.

“I know we usually have a monthly date here and I do plan to keep that up, Lian has a killer new idea with a lizard wearing a top hat,” Roy says a little nervousness in his words. He reaches up adjusting his hat, a nervous tick Jason has picked up on over the months, it’s a little thing most people would overlook, but no matter how much time passes his training from Bruce is always there telling him to watch every little move and tick of every person he encounters. “But I was thinking we could have another date before that, you know one that's not here and not you giving me a tattoo. Maybe over dinner?”

Jason’s eyes drop down to Roy’s at that quickly looking away from where he’d been watching him play with his hat.

Evidently Jason is quiet for far too long because Roy starts to fumble the hat around even more.

“Obviously if I’ve read everything wrong all these months then we can just act like this never happened and call it nothing more than a friend hang,” Roy rambles. “Or you know just let me die of embarrassment for a few more minutes and we’ll only ever see each other inside these four walls.”

“No,” Jason says finally snapping out of his shock that Roy just asked him out. “I mean yes, yes I’d love to go to dinner with you on a date.”

Roy puts his hat back on properly and smiles that big smile of his again.

“Great, how about Friday? Lian’s having a sleepover at Dinah and Ollie’s, so I’d be all yours for the evening,” Roy says, there is a little bit of implication in his words, months of built up charm and tension pouring out.

“Friday works for me,” Jason replies easy with his own smile no doubt as big as Roy’s.

**Author's Note:**

> First time writing JayRoy, so hopefully it was alright.
> 
> find me on tumblr: [alecmagnuslwb](https://alecmagnuslwb.tumblr.com/)


End file.
